Friday, January 14, 2011

Home?

I guess I've decided that I'm going to continue blogging since my travelling adventures will resume in May with a trip to Australia and New Zealand. However, I do have to warn you that things will probably be pretty bland throughout my school semester so I can't guarantee this will be an interesting read, especially compared to my fun filled weekends abroad.

After my ski-trip-filled-holidays things have kind of settled down in regards to my location as I'm stuck in E-town until at least the Family Day long weekend due to classes and my need to make some $$. I've been here for 5 days solid now -- which feels like ages to me -- and a full week of school under my belt. My course load is not too heavy (only 3 classes) so long as I passed all my classes in France (I'm still waiting to hear as grades are not due for the profs until Jan 28). I'm back to work as a server at Hudsons Bourbon Street to try and fund my August adventure. I'm keeping the location under wraps (for those who don't already know) until I'm sure about it because I think it might make me more bummed if I talk about it and get excited and then it doesn't work out for some reason.

Well...what do I have to say about being back in Edmonton? It's been mentally challenging -- I am definitely experiencing reverse culture shock even though it might not be outwardly obvious. Maybe I was expecting more comfort from seeing my friends and family than I actually feel but something still feels "off" for me. It's like everyone went about living their lives and not much changed but a whole lot in me changed, and being planted back in this monotonous seeming life is just kind of a let-down. I know I can't expect that I can travel to different countries, on weekends, for the rest of my life but it still feels strange. I am still enjoying being close to family and friends but that also means that I'm further away from other friends.

Another thing I already knew from my experience in Montreal, Panama and Bolivia, is that when you stay somewhere for either a long period of time (over a month) or when your life is affected significantly during the trip, you leave a piece of your heart behind. What you thought was your home (in my case, Edmonton) slowly becomes more simply a "home base" with numerous other places you can now call home. You leave your heart behind in the environment, in the culture of the country, in the language and in the relationships you built. All this just makes it that much harder once you've returned to the "home base."

On a lighter note, there are some things that I appreciate more now that I'm back in Canada -- things I had in France and am only working towards in Edmonton.

1) I find more peace in solitude. For those of you who know me, you know I'm an extrovert with a jam-packed social schedule. I realized I actually quite enjoyed the nights to myself in France when I was done working on homework and could just pour myself a glass of wine and read, watch tv or enjoy my dinner. Don't get my wrong, I quite enjoyed hanging out with friends in Grenoble and my busy weekends of travelling but the peace and quiet was nice every once in a while. BUT it is still a constant challenge for me to slow my life down, especially after being away for a semester, but I'm trying...always trying.

2) I have too much stuff. I kind of started learning this lesson a long time ago but it was more in the sense that I became grateful for the things that I have in comparison with those I met in both Bolivia and Panama. Ultimately, I think I still felt like I needed to have those things around me to feel comfortable. Living in France with not much to furnish my room really showed me that extra things I have don't keep me happy and don't add anything to my life. Don't get me wrong, you won't see me tossing my things and living with the bare minimum but the clutter in my life is actually getting to me now and is most definitely going to be reduced.

Just some of the stuff that has been on my mind as of late. Some of it still needs to be processed too so I'm sure you'll be hearing more in the coming months. Enjoy your weekend!

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Mountains!

Since I've been home in Edmonton, Canada I decided it would be best to take advantage of the snow that has blanketed the mountains. SO, I headed on the Downhill Riders trip to Whitefish, Montana for New Years with my friend Robyn and 7 others. It was a gong-show busride for the 10 hrs or so it took to get there but we had a blast! We skiied 2 days of the 4 and enjoyed the challenge of the mountain and the powder that had fallen. The company was awesome along with the cheap alcohol and relaxation time.

After my quick escapade to the USA I was home for 2 days and my dad, sister (her boyfriend) and I hit the highway for our annual family ski trip. This years location of choice was Banff, Alberta and skiing at Sunshine. The snow kept falling so we had an amazing amount of powder which was just perfect for trying out my NEW snowboard that I got for Christmas! :D I got an Arbor Push board made of bamboo (which makes it super light) with Salomon boots and bindings. Needless to say I was excited to start riding!! I also loved that I finally got to see one of my good friends Steph because she has been living in Canmore, AB since finishing university. The weekend finished off with a quick stay in Calgary, AB with my cousins and their super adorably lovable daughter Ayla (13 months old).

There's no way I can say I didn't make the most of my Christmas holidays and even though it was busy I enjoyed every minute of it. Tonight I'm relaxing with a glass of wine and trying not to think about the inevitable start of school and classes which begin tomorrow. At least it's my final semester of my Bachelors Degree!

Canadaland

To be honest, as soon as I arrived in Canada I forgot about my blog. It seems that the busyness of my life before I left was just put on hold and ready to bombard me as soon as I got home again. But it has been fun too.

In the end, Jess and I never made it to Marrakech which was (more than) thoroughly dissapointing for me. I was soooo excited to check out the "riads", maybe go to a spa, go 4x4ing, take a camel ride and be in a warm climate before heading back to frigid Canada. We left Grenoble, France at 5am on Friday December 17, 2010 after an evening of celebrating. Unfortunately, we missed our flight at 7am due to circumstances that were out of our control but also due to the lack of organization and communication on the part of the airport storage staff. We then decided to shell out the extra 200 euro to pay for a new flight to Morocco later that evening. We waited around the airport in Lyon all day and evening because our flight was delayed and eventually cancelled and not because of the weather (like many other flights) but because there was no crew to fly our plane. This left us a bit in despair seeing as all the hotels around the airport were now booked and no taxis were willing to drive into town because of the "horrific weather" (a little snow) that they were experiencing.Luckily Jess and I were able to book a hotel in Lyon on an airport computer and caught the last Rhone Express train to town. We had to stay at a hotel for 3 nights, basically waiting until our flight home to Canada was to depart on Tuesday December 21, 2010. We decided just to relax, watch movies, re-packing, eat macaroons and pain au chocolat and try to dissolve our bitterness over Morocco.
The weather was not letting up and we had read on Facebook that many of our other classmates were stuck in Lyon or in other parts of Europe during their attempts to get home for the holidays. London Heathrow and Paris Charles de Gaulle were essentially closed due to large snowfall and the airports unpreparedness for handling this type of weather. The other regional airports such as Frankfurt and Lyon were having issues flying since the snow would fall, melt (because weather sat around zero degrees) and then would freeze again and all the runways could not be cleared or it was not safe to fly. Needless to say, Jess and I started getting concerned about making it to Frankfurt on Tuesday (the first leg of our flight home). In the end we switched that flight to Monday and spend a solid 22 hours in the Frankfurt airport, overnight, until our flight to Calgary left the next afternoon.

If you look close this picture is of the departure monitors in Frankfurt and you can see that over 90% of the flights the day we left Europe were cancelled.

Either way both us and our luggage made it home to Canada, eventually, and after some stressing and large amounts of frustration. I've got to say though that when I took my first breath as I walked off the plane in Canada, the air was so cold I started coughing because my lungs couldn't take it. Not a pleasant welcome.

Best part about being home was that I got to see my friends and family and that I was home for Christmas, especially when I knew there were so many people that were still stuck in airports and didn't make it home for the holidays.